Abstract
Most studies of the organizational buying process assume that buyers acquire and use information “prosocially”—to make better decisions and promote their company’s welfare. The authors propose, however, that demands to account for their behavior causes organizational buyers to also gather and use information for political purposes—to protect their own self-interest. The authors present the results of an empirical study that investigates the extent to which four types of accountability—informal, official, process, and decision accountability—result in political (or symbolic) information search and prosocial information analysis by organizational buyers. Study findings suggest that buyers accountable to superiors and those accountable to subordinates or peers engage in more symbolic information search. Buyers accountable for their decision-making process analyze information more extensively. Surprisingly, buyers accountable for decision outcomes neither search for symbolic information nor analyze information more extensively.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Adelberg, Sheldon and C. Daniel Batson. 1978. “Accountability and Helping: When Needs Exceed Resources.”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 36 (4): 343–350.
Anderson, James C. and David W. Gerbing. 1988. “Structural Equation Modeling in Practice: A Review and Recommended Two Step Approach.”Psychological Bulletin 103 (3): 411–423.
Anderson, Paul F. and Terry M. Chambers. 1985. “A Reward/Measurement Model of Organizational Buying Behavior.”Journal of Marketing 49 (Spring): 7–23.
Ashton, Robert H. 1992. “Effects of Justification and a Mechanical Aid on Judgment Performance.”Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 52 (July): 292–306.
Baumeister, Roy F. 1982. “A Self-Presentational View of Social Phenomena.”Psychological Bulletin 19:3–26.
Beach, Lee Roy and Terence R. Mitchell. 1978. “A Contingency Model for the Selection of Decision Strategies.”Academy of Management Review 3 (July): 439–449.
Brief, Arthur P., Janet M. Dukerich, and Lucinda I. Doran. 1991. “Resolving Ethical Dilemmas in Management: Experimental Investigations of Values, Accountability, and Choice.”Journal of Applied Social Psychology 21 (5): 380–396.
Brief, Arthur P. and Stephan J. Motowidlo. 1986. “Prosocial Organizational Behaviors.”Academy of Management Review 11 (4): 710–712.
Bunn, Michele D. 1987. “Taxonomy of Purchase Decision Approaches and Organizational Purchase Situations.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
————— 1993. “Taxonomy of Buying Decision Approaches.”Journal of Marketing 57 (January): 38–56.
Caldwell, David F. and Charles A. O’Reilly. 1982. “Responses to Failure: The Effects of Choice and Responsibility on Impression Management.”Academy of Management Journal 25 (March): 121–136.
Crowne, Douglas P. and David Marlowe. 1960. “A New Scale of Social Desirability Independent of Psychopathology.”Journal of Consulting Psychology 24:349–354.
Curley, Shawn P., J. Frank Yates, and Richard A. Abrams. 1986. “Psychological Sources of Ambiguity Avoidance.”Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 38 (2): 230–256.
Fandt, Patricia M. 1990. “The Relationship of Accountability and Interdependent Behavior to Enhancing Team Consequences.”Group & Organization Studies 16 (3): 300–312.
Fandt, Patricia M. and Gerald R. Ferris. 1990. “The Management of Information and Impressions: When Employees Behave Opportunistically.”Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 45 (February): 140–158.
Feldman, Martha S. and James G. March. 1981. “Information in Organizations as Signal and Symbol.”Administrative Science Quarterly 26 (June): 171–186.
Ferris, Gerald R., Gail S. Russ, and Patricia M. Fandt. 1989. “Politics in Organizations.” InImpression Management in the Organization, edited by Robert A. Giacalone and Paul Rosenfeld, 143–170. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Gerbing, David W. and James C. Anderson. 1988. “An Updated Paradigm for Scale Development Incorporating Unidimensionality and Its Assessment.”Journal of Marketing Research 25 (2): 186–192.
Hendricks, Michael and Philip Brickman. 1974. “Effects of Status and Knowledgeability of Audience on Self-Presentation.”Sociometry 37 (3): 440–449.
Jackson, Donald W., Janet E. Keith, and Richard K. Burdick. 1987. “The Relative Importance of Various Promotional Elements in Different Industrial Purchase Situations.”Journal of Advertising 16 (4): 25–33.
Klimoski, Richard and Lawrence Inks. 1990. “Accountability Forces in Performance Appraisal.”Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 45 (April): 194–208.
Langley, Ann. 1989. “In Search of Rationality: The Purposes Behind the Use of Formal Analysis in Organizations.”Administrative Science Quarterly 34 (December): 598–631.
McAllister, Daniel W., Terence R. Mitchell, and Lee Roy Beach. 1979. “The Contingency Model for the Selection of Decision Strategies: An Empirical Test of the Effects of Significance, Accountability, and Reversibility.”Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 24 (2): 228–244.
McQuiston, Daniel H. and Peter R. Dickson. 1991. “The Effect of Perceived Personal Consequences on Participation and Influence in Organizational Buying.”Journal of Business Research 23 (September): 159–177.
Meltsner, Arnold J. 1976.Policy Analysts in the Bureaucracy. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Moriarty, Rowland T. and Robert E. Spekman. 1984. “An Empirical Investigation of the Information Sources Used During the Industrial Buying Process.”Journal of Marketing Research 21 (May): 137–147.
O’Reilly, Charles A. 1983. “The Use of Information in Organizational Decision Making: A Model and Some Propositions.”Research in Organizational Behavior 5:103–139.
Pfeffer, Jeffrey. 1981. “Management as Symbolic Action: The Creation and Maintenance of Organizational Paradigms.”Research in Organizational Behavior 3:1–52.
Puffer, Sheila M. 1987. “Prosocial Behavior, Noncompliant Behavior, and Work Performance Among Commission Salespeople.”Journal of Applied Psychology 72 (4): 615–621.
Schlenker, Barry R. 1980.Impression Management: The Self-Concept, Social Identity, and Interpersonal Relations. Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.
Sherlock, Paul. 1991.Rethinking Business to Business Marketing. New York: Free Press.
Staw, Barry M. 1976. “Knee-Deep in the Big Muddy: A Study of Escalating Commitment to a Chosen Course of Action.”Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 16 (1): 27–44.
Staw, Barry M. and Frederick V. Fox. 1977. “Escalation: The Determinants of Commitment to a Course of Action.”Human Relations 30 (5): 431–450.
Staw, Barry M. and Jerry Ross. 1978. “Commitment to a Policy Decision: A Multitheoretical Perspective.”Administrative Science Quarterly 23 (1): 40–64.
Tetlock, Philip E. 1983. “Accountability and the Complexity of Thought.”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 45 (1): 74–83.
————— 1985. “Accountability: The Neglected Social Context of Judgment and Choice.”Research in Organizational Behavior 7:297–332.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
She received her Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research interests include industrial buying behavior, business-to-business relationships, and international marketing. She has published articles in theJournal of International Marketing and theJournal of Macromarketing, as well as various conference proceedings.
He received his Ph.D. from Northwestern University. His research interests are in the marketing strategy and public policy areas. His work has been published inJournal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, Journal of Advertising Research, and several other journals.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Doney, P.M., Armstrong, G.M. Effects of accountability on symbolic information search and information analysis by organizational buyers. JAMS 24, 57–65 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02893937
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02893937